


To Love Somebody

by Savageandwise



Series: What For? [2]
Category: Music RPF, Oasis (Band), Real Person Fiction
Genre: Angst, F/M, Gallaghercest | Liam Gallagher/Noel Gallagher Incest, M/M, POV Outsider
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-19
Updated: 2020-10-10
Packaged: 2021-03-07 15:54:15
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 9,646
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26550214
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Savageandwise/pseuds/Savageandwise
Summary: September 1994, Noel Gallagher meets Melissa Lim at The Bottom of the Hill in San Francisco. Three days later after a disastrous gig at the Whiskey a Go Go in L.A., Noel leaves the band and flies back to Melissa. The band has no idea where he is. Something happened in L.A., something worse than a blown gig and a few lines of meth.
Relationships: Liam Gallagher/Noel Gallagher, Noel Gallagher/Melissa Lim
Series: What For? [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1930828
Comments: 30
Kudos: 57





	1. A Certain Kind of Light

**Author's Note:**

> This fic is a sort of prequel to my fic Let Me Be The One.

He doesn't look like much at first, the guitarist, but he has a beautiful wounded look in his eyes. Melissa is captivated. When he opens his mouth to speak, his accent is to die for. He sits next to her on the sofa and says, "I'm Noel, I'm with the ...with the...the...the...I'm with Oasis."

According to _Webster's Dictionary_ an oasis is a green or fertile area in an arid region (such as a desert). The way Noel says "oasis" sounds like he's been wandering in the desert for forty days and forty nights. He'd given up hope on ever seeing water again. That's how he looks at her too. Here's a man waiting to be saved.

He shifts seamlessly from shy to arrogant to excitable and back. He has a habit of biting the cuticles on his thumb nervously. It makes her want to kiss him. She finally does and she isn't disappointed, except when they're interrupted by this guy catapulting himself into the seat beside them. 

"Alright, gorgeous?" the guy says. 

It's the frontman. Up close he's the most breathtaking man she's ever seen. He's clearly Noel's brother. His name is Liam. He leans over Noel's lap to pick a bit of lint out of her hair. His mouth is so beautiful she can't look away. Whenever he says anything at all to her, he looks at Noel out of the corner of his eye. He isn't really flirting with her, she realises. It's all for Noel. She can feel the tension between them like a tightened guitar string. Sibling rivalry at its finest, she assumes. She always wanted a brother or sister. Not being able to make out in peace sucks big time but it would be worth it, as far as she's concerned, if only she had a sibling.

Finally, Liam curls up with a blonde just a few feet away from them. Noel is flustered and then a bit angry, the silent sort of angry. He pulls her to her feet and drags her past his brother and the blonde. He's different in the cab. Decisive. His fingers slide up her thigh, under her skirt, brush the edge of her underwear. 

"Oh, yeah?" she asks, but she likes it. "Where are we going?"

"To the afterparty," he says. He takes her to his hotel room.

She likes how he fucks, that distracted sort of edge. Not like he's not there with her—he is—like he's caught up in the urgency of it. When he comes, he sounds almost surprised and then exhilarated, presses his face into her neck, sighing, his breath shuddering out. She can feel his long lashes against her skin.

"You feel so good," he whispers.

"Thanks."

It's one of those things guys say. Just one of their lines, but he sounds so serious she almost believes he means it.

"Like...like...coming home to a place I've never been before. Does that...do you know what I mean?"

She pulls away to look at him, startled by his words.

" _Somewhere i have never travelled, gladly beyond…_ " she quotes. It doesn't quite fit, but it's the first thing that comes to her mind.

"What?" he laughs.

"It's a poem, by E.E. Cummings," she explains. 

"What's the next line?"

" _Your slightest look easily will unclose me_  
_though i have closed myself as fingers,_  
_you open always petal by petal myself as Spring opens,_ " she recites. She skipped a bit, but he doesn't know the difference.

"That's beautiful, that," he says.

He's lying on his back on top of the duvet, his hands folded over his chest. And it hits her hard, he's beautiful. Not in that unselfconscious way like his brother, but he's beautiful.

"I write all the songs, you know," he says.

He rolls over and leans on his elbow, looks up at her all wide-eyed and earnest.

"They're great. It was a great set. You're really going somewhere," she says. She thinks he is, he's already gone, already less human than he was an hour ago, already more like a picture in a magazine.

She wakes up to Liam flopping over their legs at five in the morning.

"Fucking boring here. Let's order some fucking room service," he says belligerently.

Noel hits him over the head with a pillow, but he still doesn't leave. He fingers her nipple in full view of Liam, kisses her good morning. Liam makes obnoxious mock kissing noises. She writes her number on a hotel matchbook before she slinks off wearing last night's clothes. 

"If you're ever back in town and need a tour guide," she says.

Liam makes snoring noises. She can hear them shouting as she walks down the hall.

Noel calls her three days later. He sounds so exhausted he can barely stutter out a sentence. His accent is so thick she has to ask him to repeat himself. 

"I said I'll be back in San Francisco as soon as I can get a flight out of here. Can I see you?"

"Where are you? L.A.? How was the Whiskey?"

There's such a long pause she fears he's hung up.

"Can I see you?" He's trying hard for casual, but he just sounds desperate and bone-weary.

She gives him the address of a coffee shop near her apartment. He arrives in a cab, looking like he hasn't slept in days. His skin is almost grey and he stinks, reeks of old booze and cigarettes. He's still beautiful, so fragile, he looks as though he's made of glass. She knows he's twenty-seven, she asked him three days ago, but he looks like he's at least ten years younger than that in his Beatles T-shirt and flannel shirt. She buys him a cup of coffee and a blueberry muffin.

He doesn't talk much. She tells him about a gig she saw last night and he eats a few crumbs of muffin. Then she asks him if he wants to come home with her and have a shower. He manages a curt but grateful nod and she can see he was banking on this invitation. He doesn't have a backup plan. Something happened in L.A. and she can tell he wants to talk about it, but she knows if she asks, he'll retreat into his shell and that will be it. He has his shower and puts on her robe. She gives him a new toothbrush and sits on the closed toilet seat while he brushes his teeth. He lies down on top of her duvet and sleeps for eight hours straight and when he wakes up, he looks almost normal again.

"Did something happen?" she asks cautiously.

"It's over," he says. He sounds like he's trying to convince himself. She assumes he's talking about the band.

Then he reaches for her, puts his head against her breast for a moment before sliding down her body and pulling her skirt up and her tights down. 

"Alright," she laughs. "Talking is overrated."

"Too fucking right," he mumbles. 

Melissa's not complaining about a good-looking, talented British guy who wants to go down on her and then listen to records the rest of the night. She knows it's just a distraction, though. She puts on _Voodoo Lounge_ and he has a lot to say suddenly about the ancient art of guitar weaving and basslines and lyrics. 

"Everything the Stones did after '73 is shite," Noel declares confidently. 

They're sitting on the floor looking through her record collection. He's got a Smiths album cradled in his lap.

"You know, Johnny Marr lent me a guitar. I fucking wrote 'Live Forever' on it."

He looks down like he's remembering something private, flushes a bit and then looks back up at her. There's that hopelessness again. Like a rat trapped in a cage.

"Did something happen at the Whiskey?"

When he reaches for her and pulls her down to the floor she knows something really bad must have happened. Something so bad he has to fuck it away. People have all sorts of ways of dealing with trauma. She wakes up in bed with him hours later and he's shivering. She pulls the blankets up over his shoulders. He's awake but pretending not to be. She doesn't say a word.

The next day she takes him to Huntington Park because it always cheers her up. She tells him she used to play there as a kid. Hopscotch, dodgeball, she drew chalk masterpieces on the asphalt. They sit near the fountain with its naked bronze youths and she gives him a penny to make a wish. He skims it on the surface of the water.

"It's called the Turtle Fountain. See the little turtles?" She points them out to him. "It's a replica of a fountain somewhere in Italy," she explains.

He nods. "That's America for you. Everything is a cover version."

He takes a sip of her Strawberry Lemonade Snapple. They discontinued the flavour and you can't always find it but Melissa has her ways.

"Fucking tastes like melted candy," he says making a face. "No wonder they put it out to pasture."

He polishes it off anyway and tastes like strawberries when she kisses him.

They watch some kids playing soccer and Noel gets up to kick the ball back to them when it rolls in his direction. She likes the way he moves. The way he dribbles the ball with his feet, showing off for the kids. He looks happy for a split second.

"Did the others just fly home? Do you want to call your brother?"

She hopes to God he doesn't say yes, because she's not sure she can afford the long distance call.

"Who?" he asks coldly.

Melissa blinks. "Liam. Your brother. Do you want to call him, tell him you're okay?"

"Thank you," he says stiffly. "That won't be necessary."

He's so fucking weird. There's something about the way he holds himself that makes her think it would be better not to argue with him, so she lets it go yet again and takes him record shopping instead. He's like a kid in a candy store, his smile so wide the corners of his eyes crinkle with delight. He buys her an album and holds her hand on the walk home. This is a man who wants to be happy, she realises. He doesn't like to wallow in misfortune. But something has got a hold of him with both hands. Something happened in L.A. just when they were about to crack America wide open, some old sorrow rearing its ugly head.

They listen to the record he bought when they get home and drink screwdrivers. The album is called _Strange Times_ by a band called The Chameleons UK. They added the "UK" because there is already a band called The Chameleons in the US. 

"That's fucking daft," Noel says. "Look at it."

He points to the cover, his lip curled in disdain.

"The Chameleons is such a retro band name anyway. How'd you come up with Oasis?" she asks.

"I didn't. Our kid...uh...Liam did. Stroke of genius, really."

She can't figure out his expression when he says that. Proud and angry and terrified. 

"It's his band, you know," he says after a while. 

"I didn't."

"Yeah. Last thing I expected, really. I thought he'd be in the nick or summat by now."

The more he talks about him, the easier it seems to get. Whatever is wrong, whatever happened, it's about Liam. 

"Do you have brothers and sisters?" he asks her. 

He hasn't asked her a lot about herself. He seemed a little more interested three days ago, but now he's preoccupied, sweet but turned inward. She doesn't blame him, that's just how it is when there's something weighing heavy on your mind. Melissa pauses for a moment before answering. She could just say no of course. It's not really any of his business.

"I do. Somewhere. My dad's other family. A brother, I think, and a sister," she says at last.

He stares at her. "Where are they, then?"

"L.A., I think. It’s complicated."

He nods curtly, tells her he knows all about deadbeat dads. Something about the way he says it makes her skin crawl.

"So, you've never met them, then?" he asks. "Lucky." 

"All I ever wanted were siblings," she says. "I used to dream about them. About what it would be like to have an older brother and sister. I could borrow her clothes, I could...he could pick me up from parties in his car. I wouldn't be so...you know...so alone." 

She feels that lump in her throat even after all this time.

"Sounds like one of them rom-coms where the cheeky teenage misfit is crowned prom queen," he says snidely.

Melissa clenches her fists futilely against the unfairness of it all. She opened up to him and here he is mocking her.

"I have two brothers," Noel says after a moment. "Liam and Paul. Paul's the eldest. It's...It's probably not what you think, you know, growing up with siblings. It was very...there was never any...any...um...space to breathe, growing up on top of each other like that. You never had space in your head to...to...to fucking think. I shared a room with Liam for...you know...for fucking years. It's mental. It's never clear what belongs to you."

He looks very lost for a moment. Like he's afloat in an ocean of memories.

"But you're not alone," Melissa pushes. 

"You're not alone," Noel agrees. "But you have to let go at some point, you know. Do your own thing."

"Your own thing," she says sceptically. "That's why you joined your brother's band."

"Well...I reckoned...I might as well...I wasn't really doing anything better, like."

She wonders if that's true, or if he pinned all his hopes on this one thing—one person—and that's why he's so devastated now that it seems to be over.

"And the boy can sing," Melissa says admiringly. 

"He's not half bad and that," Noel concedes.

"But that's finished now? The band spilt up? You know, the Whiskey is a tough crowd. It doesn't have to mean anything. Did they fly home?"

"Not exactly," Noel says hesitantly. 

Eventually he admits they're still there in L.A. That he hightailed it to San Francisco with eight hundred dollars and his passport in his pocket and a backpack full of dirty laundry. They have no idea where he is. 

She shakes her head at him. "You're going to have to tell me the whole story."

He tells her they'd been doing coke for days, really getting into it, Liam in particular. 

"He hasn't got that bit inside, that...that...button that makes you stop when you've gone too far. It's like he was born without it. Like he's fucking insatiable. No brakes on that one."

"But not you," Melissa says. She thinks of how he fucks. That delirious abandon. "You're in control."

Blotches of bright red embarrassment bloom on his cheeks and his pale neck.

"Only it was fucking meth. We couldn't sleep for days. We were well fucked. I don't know what we were playing on stage, only every song at once, and Liam was insulting the audience, calling them every name under the sun. It was…"

Disastrous.

"He flung his tambourine at me fucking head, right? We looked like the worst scally amateurs."

She can imagine how mortified he must have been. "What happened then?" She presses him.

"We went back to the hotel and I locked myself in my room. Liam and the rest of them fuckers stayed at the bar drinking. He turned up a few hours later fucking crying and moaning for me to let him in."

"He apologised?"

Noel shrugged. "Said he was sorry anyway."

"So he threw a tambourine at you and you left?" she asks. There's something about the way he's telling the story that makes her think there's more to it than he's saying. He looks like a kid telling the teacher the dog ate his homework.

"It was fucking horrible. It felt like...like...like I was stuck in a nightmare. The whole fucking gig. Like it was never going to end, right?"

"But it did...end," Melissa says. She waits patiently, but that's it, he's done talking about it.

They get drunk on screwdrivers, vodka with just a hint of Tropicana orange juice, and he grabs her camera.

"Take your top off," he says, smiling winsomely. 

"You take yours off," she suggests.

He takes it all off. Sticks out his hip like a Victoria's Secret model striking a pose, tilts back his head. She takes his picture like that. And then prone on her bed, his arm trailing off the edge. He's half hard, looking up at her, wary and challenging. She straddles him, points the lense downwards to catch his face: lips parted, thick brows raised, eyes shut. She wants to catch the light on the thin, faintly oily skin of his eyelids, thick lashes spiky and black against his cheek. She wants to catch that horror he's struggling to keep locked inside. It's there, just beneath the surface, she can almost touch it. She stares at him through the camera, willing him to open up.

He pulls her down against him instead, and she sighs. He's going to have to let go eventually, isn't he? She rides him hard as he stares up at her, shocked at her intensity and glowing with pleasure. And yet, even after he comes, she can still feel him holding back. He sleeps fitfully, gets up in the middle of the night to smoke by the window. At least three cigarettes, one after the other. Then he goes to the phone but doesn't make a call.

She gets up early to buy a newspaper and Strawberry Lemonade Snapple. The newsstand has international papers too, and Melissa thinks she'll pick up a British music magazine for Noel. And there he is on the cover, standing beside his brother. She opens the magazine to find the article. It's all about the Japanese leg of their tour. There's a photo of Noel staring dead straight ahead. That same challenging look he gave her last night. Like the walls are up inside him. His eyes dead, his mouth rigid with palpable annoyance. Liam is leaning down, looking up at him, his face isn't visible, but every line of his body is beseeching. Look at me, his posture screams, see me. But Noel won't look at him. 

She buys the magazine and a _San Francisco Chronicle_ , four Snapples and a pack of Wrigley's Spearmint. Noel is still asleep when she gets home, so she grabs his dirty clothes to take them downstairs to the Laundromat. A gold ring falls out of the pocket of a pair of jeans. A crown and a heart encircled by two hands. She lets it rest in the palm of her hand for a moment before putting it back into his backpack in the pocket that holds his passport. Then she writes him a note and goes downstairs.

She's waiting for the clothes to dry, reading the magazine, when he turns up wearing her Sex Pistols T-shirt, looking sleep-rumpled and a little lost. He clearly picked this T-shirt over any of the others that would have fit him just as nicely. She likes that.

"Not sure how much you'll make on my clobber here. You'll want to try Japan. I think me shorts'll fetch a pretty penny in Tokyo. Unwashed, though," he says, sliding next to her in front of the wall of dryers.

She wrinkles her nose at him. "Sign them for me?" 

"Not a chance," he says with a cocky smile.

She holds up the magazine. "It's all about those Gallagher brothers and their antics, it seems."

"Yeah?" His tone is distinctly frosty. "The fuck do they know?"

The magazine falls open to that photo of Noel and Liam. On the next page they're blue on blue, Liam bent down and staring into the camera knowingly. Noel is leaning on him, mouth sulky, his eyes hidden behind shades. Glinting on Liam's pinky is the same ring she just found in Noel's jeans pocket.

"They know you're going to be big. You're already big."

He stares straight ahead, watching his clothes go round and round.

"Don't you think you could go back, patch things up? I'm sure he didn't mean to hurt you," she says gently.

"You know fuck all about him," Noel says quietly. "Fuck all, right? That's all...that's all he...that's all he fucking does. Just takes and takes and demands all eyes on him all the time." 

He puts his thumb down over Liam's face in the magazine, shivers. "Can't do it no more."

She doesn't think he's talking about the band. They're having a conversation in two different languages, talking over each other. And she doesn't know what it's about.

"You're right, I don't know him. I shouldn't have presumed," she says carefully.

Noel turns to face her, his eyes unfocused. "What if...what if, right? What if I...he didn't hurt me, right? What if I hurt him?"

She sets the magazine down on the chair beside her and looks down at his hands. He's wearing the ring on his right hand. "Did you?"

He shrugs hopelessly. 

"What did you do?" she whispers.

The machine beeps, but Melissa makes no move to empty it.

"Only...we were so fucked up on drugs...We hadn't slept in days. I was off me head…"

He pauses there and looks straight at her and shakes his head. She can't imagine what he could have done that would warrant the expression on his face. He's pale as paper. His eyes are wild. 

"You hit him?" she suggests.

Noel puts his head in his hands, his shoulders are trembling.

"Hey," Melissa says softly. "Hey...he loves you. He's your brother...anyone can see it...I only met him once and I could tell. He worships the ground you walk on."

He looks up at her, his mouth agape in shock, blinks several times in rapid succession. He dashes away the tears hastily. She realises with a jolt he's used to hiding his tears. He learned how to hide pain, probably early in life. In the pit of her stomach is a horrible coldness. After a while he clears his throat.

"Let's get out of here, yeah?" he says at last.


	2. And I'm Blind, So, So, So Blind

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Let's get out of here, yeah?" he says at last.
> 
> Melissa finds out what happened in L.A.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the brief confusion. I wasn't sure if I should continue this story but I did and I will. One more chapter after this.
> 
> Special thanks to Twinka. I can't write without you and don't want to.

She takes his clothes out of the dryer and they go back upstairs. She changes her shoes while he washes his face. Then she takes him to Ocean Beach. It's a fairly mild day and there are even a few people swimming. Noel eyes the ocean warily, takes a deep shuddering breath.

"I didn't think to ask if you'd want to swim," Melissa says. "It's pretty cold in the water and kind of dangerous. And I wouldn't have had anything you could wear."

Noel shakes his head. "Can't swim anyway."

She laughs out loud before she can stop herself. "Who can't swim?"

"I can't." His cheeks are very red. "Liam can't, either."

She doesn't want to say anything after that in case he gets upset again. They sit in the sand and look out at the waves in silence for a time.

"It's different, isn't it? The Pacific. Different than the Atlantic, I mean...It feels…feels like you can't even imagine how fucking big it is," he says after a while. "It's dead terrifying."

She ponders that for a moment. "I guess we can't control it. It's just there. That's kind of scary, isn't it? People drown here all the time because of the rip currents."

He gives her a strange look. 

"They occur near the surface of the water, pushing out away from the shore. Inexperienced swimmers tire themselves out trying to move against the current."

He nods vaguely, keeps on staring at the waves crashing on the shore. 

"That's what happened," he says suddenly. 

"What happened?" 

"In L.A.," he explains. "A rip current."

She doesn't know what the hell he's talking about. He's still staring straight ahead, digging his fingers into the sand.

"It's always been a love-hate thing. With us. Maybe because our dad didn't beat Liam. He didn't have to go through all that, you know. He's the youngest. He was free. And I know...I know...Liam loves me. I know he just wants me to...wants me...he just wants me to praise him. Because he was the pretty one, he was the baby and everyone acted like he walked on water. Except me. I never did...so he'll do just about anything for my attention. And it makes me well angry. I don't know why."

"Okay," she says softly. She hopes it sounds encouraging, but she's still not sure what he's trying to tell her.

"And the angrier I get, the more he pushes. And pushes and pushes. We're running on meth and adrenaline and coffee and fucking tequila and then more meth. And there's Liam. Pushing and pushing me. And I can't fucking think anymore…"

He steals a look at her and then looks away again. 

"I can't think. And he won't let it go. And there's me trapped...like a fucking...like…"

He tilts forward and then back again, rocking himself, his chin on his knees. 

"...like a swimmer caught in your...your...your rip current."

What happened? Melissa thinks, what did you do? She's cold all at once, her stomach tying knots in itself.

"I couldn't stop it happening. And he's no help, either. He's begging for it, right? Begging for it...and oh, God...So, what...what should...what should I have...have...done? Tell me!" His voice is worn thin in places.

"Begging for what?" she asks. She feels like she's about to cry, but doesn't know why.

He holds her gaze shakily until she has to look away. 

"What did you do?"

He grips his knees tightly. "You don't understand. No one does."

"Then tell me…" she begins. He's far away all at once, lost in memory. He can't even hear her.

"We shared a room for years, you know. Picture the smallest room you can imagine, then cut it in half. That was our room. Now cut it in half again and again. That's how it felt inside my head. All the time. I was stuck in there. Stuck treading water. I had all these...things I wanted. All these dreams."

He pauses now. She can see that despite the bravado, those dreams must have seemed like folly to him. Working class, living at home, sharing a room with his little brother. Making it was one shot in a million and now he's throwing it all away, and she can't understand what in the world could be bad enough to make him do that. 

"We weren't mates, exactly. Most of the time he was a right pain in the arse. Most of the time it was all...all I could do to keep from...from fucking strangling him. That's what it's like, having a brother, you know what I mean?"

It occurs to her he's being cruel now, spitting her own dream back in her face. She almost doesn't care what his deep dark secret is. She wants to tell him he's being a jerk.

"But he was there. He knew things no one else did. He knew about the songs. He...we belonged…"

"It's never clear what belongs to you. That's what it's like having a brother, you know," she quotes back at him cruelly. 

"He belonged to me," he murmurs as if he's only just realised it. "You should have seen him on stage that first time. Trying to be Ian Brown, looking like...like a fucking star, even then. And the first time he sang a song I had written...he said it was magic. That's what he said. That it was meant to be. I don't believe in that shite, but it was. We belonged together. At least that's what I told myself." He's babbling, his words spilling into each other. His expression is so affectionate, so tender, she can't quite figure him out. He clearly loves his brother and despises him. And desperately needs him.

"I don't understand," she says softly, because she doesn't. He's trying frantically to hint at something she can't guess at. Maybe she doesn't want to understand. Maybe she knows instinctively it's better not to know.

"I don't understand," he parrots mockingly. "Don't you? Don't you understand?" 

Melissa shakes her head. She wants to get the hell out of here, because she knows whatever he says next, will change everything. 

"He said it's what he wanted, right? He said it was magic, so how could it be wrong? So I did. I did it, God help me. I did it. I watched him being born and I still did it to him. Right there on the floor of his hotel room, fucking high as a kite on meth. I told myself I could stop whenever I wanted...I meant to, but he just…" Noel breaks off there, a shiver rippling through him. "Do you understand now?"

At first she doesn't. She rolls his words around in her head like a marble at the bottom of a jar, faster and faster until it shatters. And then she does understand and she wishes she could go back to five minutes ago, when she didn't have a clue. She scrambles to her feet, kicking sand into his lap, and stands there for a moment, breathing hard. He screwed his brother. That's what he's been trying to say. That's what's been tearing him apart. She just stares at him, her stomach turning somersaults.

He curls in on himself, shoulders hunched forward, hands twisted in knots.

"That's it, isn't it? I've buggered it up, haven't I?" Noel says from behind his hands.

Melissa winces. She shrugs even though he's not looking at her and wraps her arms around herself. She keeps taking a few steps towards the water and then back again, a step further each time, working up the nerve to split. He screwed his brother. Melissa swallows down her saliva and concentrates on not throwing up.

Eventually Noel lifts his head and stares straight out at the sea. She sinks down in the sand beside him silently, too exhausted for a scene. She watches the sanderlings and sandpipers dance along the stretch of shore, digging in the sand for insects. When she turns her head to look at him, his face is wet with tears, his nose is running, his shoulders twitch every now and again. She has a pack of Kleenex in her pocket, but she doesn't offer him one. He said Liam asked for it. Begged for it. 

"Just once? Just in L.A.?" she manages at last.

Noel lets out a sound that's half laugh, half sob. He shakes his head slowly. "You hate me now, don't you? I make you sick."

She can't answer that. She can't even think straight. She looks into his bloodshot eyes and then looks away.

"I didn't start it, if that helps. He started it. He...fuck!" He puts his face back into his hands. "I'm sorry...I'm so sorry…"

She doesn't think he's talking to her. He mumbles into his knees. She thinks she hears him say, "You can't forgive me, can you?"

Melissa pulls the packet of Kleenex out of her pocket and hands him one. He balls it up, but doesn't use it. Her hand hovers over his shoulder. 

The masochistic side of her wants to ask him for all the details. When did it start? How did it start? What does he mean he hurt Liam? Did he injure him physically? What does this mean for her? What does this mean for her? Doesn't he want her? Didn't he spend the last few days fucking her on every surface in her apartment? Wasn't she there for him when no one else was? Doesn't he want her like she wants him?

There's a spasm in her chest. She realises, that in spite of this horrible confession, she really, really likes this guy. Melissa rubs her thumb against his neck for a split second and he turns to face her, his blue eyes round with surprise. Her mom once told her life is a give-and-take game, and that sometimes you're put into someone's life because they need help. They need a guardian angel. Sometimes it looks like you're not getting anything out of it. But that's not true. Life is about the give and take.

So she takes him home. They order Chinese food and watch old movies and drink cheap wine. He keeps looking over at her like he wants to say something, but doesn't know how. She keeps willing him not to speak. When she finally gets up to go to bed, he manages to spit it out.

"I'll sleep on the couch."

She tells him not to be stupid, the couch will ruin his back. They lie side by side in silence until she's sure he must have fallen asleep. Melissa pinches herself. She's back in bed with this guy whose face is on the cover of every British music magazine, and today he told her he slept with his brother.

She pictures them together, her stomach heaving: Liam leaning over Noel at the Bottom of the Hill, when they met, his hand in Noel's lap, his eyes scanning Noel's face hungrily. She should have known then. There's a tightness between her legs. She shifts slightly, puts her hand on Noel's arm. His eyes are wide open, he tilts his head towards hers. She takes his hand and presses it against her panties. He swallows, slides his hand under the thin cotton. She's so wet she's disgusted with herself. She's so wet his fingers slide right into her.

He makes her come like that. She can feel him staring at her, can sense his unease and his arousal. He's holding back though, afraid she'll change her mind and kick him out. That she'll call him a pervert and spit abuse at him. She's shocked at herself. She imagines him kissing his brother. She imagines their bodies arched against each other. Melissa puts her mouth against Noel's hungrily, pulls him against her, feels him settle between her legs. His breath is shallow, he pulls her underwear down clumsily, slides down his boxers. He pushes into her, gasps her name under his breath. She imagines Liam and Noel grappling with each other on that hotel floor, imagines Noel balls deep inside him. Melissa tilts her hips up to meet him. His hand finds her breast. He's shuddering, his mouth on hers. Kissing her like he's starving for her, like all he wants is her, so she lets herself believe it's true. And then she's coming again and he is too. He stays inside her until he goes soft, his lips against her neck. Then he lets out a soft sigh of relief.

She wakes up alone and for a few seconds she thinks he's left. He's in the living room scribbling something onto a yellow legal pad. He looks up and smiles at her. Her heart is breaking, that's how beautiful his smile is.

"You writing a song?" 

He nods shyly, sets the pen down. "I couldn't sleep."

"I have a guitar up there if you want to dust it off and tune it?" She points up at the top of the bookshelf at a hard black guitar case. 

An hour later he's playing her his new song. He's got to go back, that's all she knows. He needs to get back to the band and make peace with Liam. She doesn't know much, but this much is clear as day to her. It's her mission.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Special thanks to my cousin, Paul for our lovely trip to ocean beach. So many great memories.
> 
> More thanks to where-it-will-go and janescarlett for helping me work through the big reveal.


	3. I Want My Life to Be Lived With You

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I wanna talk tonight  
> Until the mornin' light  
> 'Bout how you saved my life  
> You and me see how we are

He's different now. He's lost that nervy quality. That anger tinged with suspicion, like a cat whose tail got stepped on. He sleeps better now, he sleeps all the way through the night and she doesn't have to remind him to eat. They've settled into a kind of routine. Sometimes they walk to Chinatown and pick up custard tarts or sponge cake or she cooks him Korean food for dinner and he washes the dishes. He reorganises her records according to his own system. He acts like he has every right to be here, like he's always been here. He acts like her boyfriend and it's so thrilling she almost forgets her mission. 

She takes a bunch of sick days and stays home from work just to be with him. She keeps putting off seeing friends. They joke about her joining a cult or being abducted by aliens.

"It's only been a few days," Melissa protests.

"At least let us meet the guy!" they clamour.

Melissa isn't ready for that. Maybe deep down she knows it's never going to be for real and she wants him all for herself.

He talks about Liam now without the shame, tells her silly little stories about him. How funny he is, how honest, how clothes just look better on him than anyone else.

"The man could wear a potato sack and still look good," he declares.

She searches for a hint of his unnatural relationship with his brother. Though she can see the love plain on his face, that's all she can see. He looks like any guy talking about someone he's fond of. 

He wants to go on a cable car, pretend he's a detective in a black and white film and she's the femme fatale.

"Private dick," he smirks. 

"Kind of a tired stereotype, isn't it? Making the Asian chick the femme fatale."

"Is it?" Noel asks. "But you're exotic and mysterious."

She rolls her eyes. "Do you even know what kind of Asian I am?"

He puffs himself up a bit, all insulted. "Of course I know, I'm not a complete fucking moron…"

"Uh huh…"

"Korean," he says, beaming proudly.

"Ten out of ten," she says, giving him a thumbs up. "Lucky guess?"

"Fuck you," he says, rolling his eyes. "You told me!"

"I didn't think you were listening," she admits. " So...who is the damsel in distress?"

He thinks about it for a moment. "Liam." He giggles under his breath.

"Maybe he's the femme fatale and you're the damsel," Melissa says slyly. 

He laughs so loud the other passengers stare at them. It's more like a romantic comedy than a noir thriller. He holds her hand all afternoon and kisses her on the street. She can almost forget the incestuous twist.

There's a call when they get back in. It's some British guy looking for Noel. They figured out he's with her because they found her number scrawled on a bit of paper. 

"He was here, but just for a day before moving on to Vegas," she lies seamlessly.

He makes her write down the number and tells her to call if Noel gets in touch with her again. 

Noel's eyes grow round as dinner plates listening to her lie. "I got it all wrong," he says full of admiration. "You're the private dick."

They make love all the time. Sometimes, after, she can almost convince herself she could be enough, but she knows she wouldn't be. 

He's working his way through another song, sort of mumbling through it, when he suddenly changes the key. 

"Why'd you do that?" she asks.

"It's too high for Liam," he answers at once. His whole body tenses like she's caught him out.

But that's what she wanted, isn't it? That's what she wanted for him. 

"Do you miss him?"

He shrugs and looks past her. "Fucking relieved to be away from the cunt."

He means the exact opposite. She tries to make him see that he has to go back, that that's the only way things could ever be, but he refuses to talk about it. Finally he snaps.

"Can't you...can't you see why I can't ever be near him again? Can't you see how fucking sick this is? I don't understand why you would ask me to go back."

He's happy to argue. It's almost like he's been missing it. Melissa isn't fond of arguing, but she can do it if she has to. 

"How does it work in your head? You just leave? You just wash your hands of him? You're still brothers. Could you really live without him? Never speak to him again? I'd give anything to know my family... anything…" she says.

"You never did what I did. You never...fuck...you know what I mean." Even now he can't say it in so many words. 

"I don't know...just don't...um…" she hesitates.

"Just don't do it again?" He laughs. "You don't know Liam, you don't know what he's like. That's it...cold turkey. That's the only way I could ever…"

She can't believe they're arguing about this. She can't believe he's implying he only has two options: sever all ties forever and blow up his career or go back and be his brother's lover.

"I love how none of this is your fault. I love how he's forcing you to do this. I mean, I've seen the kid, he's pretty fucking magnetic. But honestly, have you stopped thinking about him for one second since you got here?"

He doesn't answer for ages. "You don't understand…" he says at last.

"I don't," she agrees. "I don't understand. It looks like...looks like you had a pretty messed up childhood. It looks like…"

It looks like it's not even about the sex. It's about power. It's about power and a kind of love she hasn't experienced yet. Maybe she never will. Maybe most people never experience it. And that's a good thing. That's a lucky thing. It looks like he's pretending he wants it to be over because he knows that's what he's supposed to say.

There's a tremor right then. Just a short one, maybe 2.5 on the Richter scale. The furniture barely moves, but Noel's face turns grey.

"Is that…?" he lets the words taper off.

"Don't worry about it. It's nothing," she says. "It'll pass in a minute."

"What if it's just a taste of more to come?"

She tries to reassure him as best she can. He's never experienced an earthquake before. He looks terrified and queasy. When it's over he gets up and locks himself in the bathroom. Nothing she says will make him come out. After a couple hours the doorbell rings and there's a guy standing there looking pale and anxious. 

"Is Noel here, love?"

She hesitates for a moment before letting him in. His name is Tim and he's with Creation. 

"Well, Tim with Creation. If you can get him out of the bathroom, that would be a pretty cool trick."

He's staring at her like she's an alien. She thinks he must be scared shitless. They all must be scared shitless. 

"We were going to call the FBI. We've been out of our heads...we haven't...Liam hasn't been sober in days. He's inconsolable. I mean...anything might have happened to Noel."

"How did you get this address?" she asks. 

"Noel called me back. I had to promise to come alone before he gave it to me."

She supposes she ought to be grateful he didn't turn up with Liam. She isn't entirely sure how she would have reacted. She isn't sure what to think about Noel calling him back. They've been arguing bitterly over him returning to the band and he turns around and calls them after all. 

She gets Tim a glass of water and tells him he can smoke out the window. Then she goes to the bathroom to see if Noel is ready to come out. He opens the door a crack and pulls her in. The collar of his T-shirt is drenched in blood and he's holding a pair of scissors. He's shorn off an area of his thick brown hair and is just standing there looking shell-shocked.

"I nicked me ear," he says, his voice wavering. 

"Jesus Christ," she sighs. "You're in a state."

It's not as bad as it looks, it's not even a deep cut. That sort of thing always bleeds like crazy at first and then tapers off. She has an electric razor somewhere that she used to cut her ex-boyfriend's hair with. But first she cleans up the blood and tapes up his ear and tells him to sit on the toilet seat. He wraps his arms around his chest while she sets up the razor.

"You changed your mind?" she asks at last. 

Noel shrugs. "No. But they shouldn't worry about me neither."

"Your beautiful hair," Melissa says mournfully as she moves the razor over his head, stroking away the stray bits.

"It grows fast," he mumbles. "Be down to my knees tomorrow."

"Noel…"

She cut off all her hair once, crazy in love with some guy who broke her heart. She'd looked like she'd escaped from Auschwitz. She wants to tell him everything is going to be okay, but she's pretty sure it won't be. She shaves the rest of his head, working methodically. It takes longer than expected, his hair is so thick. Then she wipes the back of his neck with a warm washcloth. He's shivering a bit and staring at himself in the mirror, shakes his head at his own image. 

"I look like a right knobhead. That's what Liam will say."

Melissa laughs weakly. "Charmer. I can see why you're desperate to get back to him."

He sticks his tongue out at her and gets up to wash his face. He lets out a soft sigh as he bends over the sink. "I'm sorry," he murmurs.

"What are you sorry about?" she manages to ask.

He scrubs some dried blood off of his jaw and leans down, his shoulders hunched, his back trembling. Melissa pulls his head to her chest and kisses the short, soft bristles. "It's okay," she says. "It's only hair."

He kisses her breast through the thin cotton of her T-shirt. "I'm sorry. You're an angel. I'm sorry." 

That's when she knows it. He's going back to the band. It's what she wanted, isn't it? She made it her noble mission. Like she was some kind of vigilante saving the music world. Like she was some kind of saint taking this guy in and letting him cry on her shoulder. She won. So why does winning feel this bad? 

They take Tim out for dinner in Chinatown and Noel pretends he's not going back with him. He wants to stay here with Melissa, he declares over crispy fried noodles and potstickers. He isn't running from the band and Liam, he just wants to be with Melissa. Tim nods like he understands: sure, of course, that makes sense. Noel is in love. 

Noel is in love, she thinks, that much is true, but not with her. 

Noel reaches up to touch the tape on his ear. "You're all just sat there like cunts, waiting for me to come back?" he asks, amused and peeved in equal measure.

"We thought you were just blowing off steam, and Liam said…" Tim lets the words trail off awkwardly.

"Oh, Liam said. What did Liam say?" There's an undercurrent of danger in Noel's tone. He told her they call him the Chief. This is the first time she can see why. 

"Liam said...well, he made it sound like he'd done something to upset you."

"Liam had done something to upset me?" 

"I don't know, man. He's been sick with worry. He kept asking if we reckoned you still wanted to be his brother."

"What did you tell him?"

"I said you can't stop being family, can you?"

Noel turns his head, places his mouth against her neck and kisses the skin there. There's a sick feeling in the bottom of her stomach. 

"We don't have to go back right away," Tim tries. "She said...she said you'd gone to  
Vegas when I called. You want to go for real? Play some blackjack? Catch a floor show? Just let things settle. It'll be warmer there, for one."

He tilts his chin at the sweater Noel is wearing. Her mom knitted it ages ago. It's far too big for her and still huge on Noel. He looks pale and shorn and so young. She can tell he hasn't heard a word Tim has said. He's still thinking about Liam.

For weeks after he leaves she still wakes up and goes straight to the living room expecting to see him there hammering out a song. She misses the constant commentary in his heavy Manc accent. She misses the way he touches her, like he's starving for it. She imagines herself as Noel Gallagher's girlfriend, imagines him writing her songs and sending her postcards from the road. She imagines being the calm centre of his world. It's a nice thought. She finds herself hoping he'll be back for her.

She goes to see her mom in the end because there isn't much her mom can't fix from skinned knees to broken hearts. She makes Melissa shiso tea and listens to the story of how she met Noel. She mentions the drugs, but conveniently leaves Liam out. With her mom looking on, Melissa finally lets herself cry.

"Is it over?" her mother asks. 

"I dunno, Mom," she admits.

"Wait and see, then. It ain't over till it's over."

Noel calls almost daily for a while, tells her everything that's going on. _What's the story, Morning Glory?_ The story is he's back in it, neck-deep. He talks about Liam freely. Every story is peppered with accounts of what Liam said, what he wore, what they fought about. He tells her how unreasonable Liam is, how difficult to manage, how childish. She asks him what Liam said when he returned. 

"Nothing. He grabbed hold me bad ear and pulled it. Like I was a naughty kid and he was my Mammy. Then he got me a beer."

There's more there, but she doesn't pry. She wonders what they did when they were alone. Did he touch Liam the way he touched her? Like it's the first time feeling skin beneath his fingertips. Did he kiss him? Gasping, like he needs him to breathe? 

They spend all their time talking about the band and Liam and his new songs. The phone calls start to taper off. She can feel him slipping away from her. She thinks if she could just meet him again things would go back to normal. Things were never normal, she realises. He was never her boyfriend. He was just in need of a guardian angel. It would be selfish to expect anything in return. That doesn't mean it doesn't hurt. When he tells her he misses her she believes it. He tells her he can't wait to see her again. She holds tight to those words. She lets them sustain her through all the nights until they meet again.

She sees him a few months later backstage at the Fillmore. He looks good. He looks like a rock star now, not a scared kid. He's friendly, sweet even, but his eyes slide over her face like he's already forgetting who she is. She's already just a girl, no longer a saviour.

Liam seems different, too. Or maybe it's just that she knows the truth now. She's peeked behind that smooth marble mask, beyond the young rock god image. He's funny, irreverent, kind, enthusiastic. He grabs her hand and kisses it, charms her with witty, silly stories of Noel as a kid, like he's a normal kid brother and she's a normal girlfriend. Every once in a while though, she catches him looking at her with a look on his face like he's trying to figure out what he makes of her.

He has a way of looking at Noel, like he can't quite believe he's really here. Like he's afraid to look away for a second in case he vanishes again. And Noel has a way of looking at Liam that makes her skin prickle with discomfort. _He belonged to me._ She can see that, too, now. 

She's waiting for Noel to finish showering before they go out for dinner, when Liam comes up to her.

"I reckon some thanks are in order," he says. 

His hair is wet and he smells freshly scrubbed, he glows. She thinks there is no way this man wasn't meant to be a star. Away from Noel's watchful eye there's something sober and strangely dark about him. 

"He said it was you done it and that," he says.

"Me?" she asks.

"Made him come back to me...to us. Yeah, we...he's the brains, you know? He's the part that makes it tick."

She can see he thinks Noel is his lucky penny, his four-leaf clover, pot at the end of the rainbow. He thinks he wouldn't have made it without him. He's thanking her but he's cautious. Like he's not sure she won't try to snatch Noel away last minute.

"He didn't need me. He always knew where he belonged," she assures him.

Liam's eyes are old, like he's seen too much already despite the fact that he's barely legally allowed to drink in this country. There's so much past there, in his storm-blue eyes. He looks at her like he can see right through her.

"That ain't what I'm on about, right? I mean you went beyond the call of duty sending him back to me even though you knew what was what. I reckon that's why he came back, right? Cause you didn't throw nothing at his head and call him twisted. Could be because you're twisted, too. Or could be love is love wherever it falls, eh?"

"Twisted?" she asks.

"Yeah, twisted…" He looks at her from underneath thick lashes. He smiles suddenly, unexpectedly, and she's completely undone. "He said you saved him. That'll do me."

He puts his hand on her arm and she can see the ring glittering on his pinkie. The gold ring Noel wears, too, heart and crown and clasping hands.

"Alright, then?" Noel asks. He walks into the room eyebrows raised, his face flushed.

"Alright." Liam gives Melissa's arm a squeeze. "Don't do nothing I wouldn't do," he says to Noel.

Noel rolls his eyes. "What wouldn't you do?"

"Nothing."

They give each other a look so private it makes Melissa's cheeks burn with embarrassment. She shouldn't be here, she thinks. All the same, she can't look away.

"My work is done here," she tells Noel over baked ziti. "You don't need me anymore."

He gives her a sheepish look and then his eyes flick down to his hand. He's got the ring on again. He twists it all the way around his finger so only the gold band shows. 

"Thank you," he says earnestly. "You're amazing, you...you're...you're like a girl in a song. Like...like...like fucking...fucking Ruby Tuesday."

"Yep," she says dryly. "I'm a fucking groupie."

"You're not angry?" he asks his voice high with astonishment. "You are!"

"I'm not. Not angry," she lies, blinks tears back, rolls her eyes upward. "I don't look back in anger. I'm a straight-ahead kind of girl."

"I didn't think…" he breaks off there, ducks his head and looks into her face. "Melissa...Melissa...Melissa," he sings gently.

She shrugs awkwardly, angrily. She thought it might come to this, but she wanted to seem cool, collected, indifferent.

"I didn't think you felt like that," he mumbles.

"You thought I was just this...angel who came out of nowhere to help you? You never thought about...I don't know...me?"

His hand darts out across the table and he grabs her hand, squeezes it gently. "I thought about...I'm a cunt...I…" he stutters.

And all at once she doesn't want to be angry at him anymore. She doesn't want to be sad. She just wants to hang onto her last shreds of dignity.

"Nevermind, fuck it. It's okay. Just write songs," she says, giving him a watery smile. "Write a million of them."

Then she orders another glass of wine, sticks on a smile and asks him about the rest of the tour. He looks at her like he can't quite trust her new sunny mood. She's not sure she trusts it herself, but it's better than doing what she really wants to do: breaking down and crying into her pasta. She cries later on her way back home and feels like an idiot for letting herself hope he had real feelings for her.

He writes a million songs. One of them is even about her. A beautiful song that breaks her heart all over again when she hears it years later. It's a fairy tale. A boy and a girl in a playground. Strawberry Lemonade. She reads somewhere that Liam refused to sing it. He called it a load of shite. She says a little prayer of thanks to him right then and there. When she closes her eyes she can just about imagine Noel's singing it just for her. She can hear the melancholy threaded through the melody, his dark secret, the cross he carries. People will hear it, but they won't understand. She does, though, she knows the truth.

_You and me see how we are._

That's the cross she carries.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Special thanks to Twinka for making this fic great

**Author's Note:**

> In order to write this I tried to research a bit about Melissa Lim. I did the best I could with what I found on her social media and the little that was written about her in Oasis books. According to her Instagram they listened to the Chameleons when they met. Check them out- cool band. The rest I made up! 
> 
> I now know everything about Strawberry Lemonade Snapple which I also researched...haha. it really was discontinued in the mid 90s.
> 
> I have family in San Francisco so it was important to me to recreate the sort of vibe I used to feel visiting my family in the 90s.
> 
> The title of this fic is from the Bee Gees song because that's my uncle's favourite band.
> 
> Thank you to twinka♡♡♡ I love you.  
> Thank you to @where-it-will-go because she loves Melissa.


End file.
